We have seen the pistes become more crowded and stressful. At Ski Weekend we have always encouraged our clients to explore the options of skiing off piste under the guidance and supervision of internationally qualified UIAGM mountain guides.
In the last 23 years we have built up an impressive team of top professionals, many of whom ski with the same Ski Weekend clients season after season. All our ski guides and instructors live locally and are selected as much for their personality and communication skills as for their professional expertise.Their familiarity with particular ski areas and their understanding of prevailing snow conditions ensures that you get the most from your time with them.
Courses are 4 full days' skiing (unless stated). Dates are inclusive. You will fly out in the evening prior to the start of the course and return after skiing on the last day.
Any four day break with us will give you an exceptional opportunity to achieve something new in your skiing. For those with more ambition, we offer exciting ski weekends based on structured courses or themes which run alongside our more recreationally based programmes.
Catering for a range of abilities; from skiers who wish to improve and gain confidence on the piste, to those who would like to venture off the piste and expand their all-mountain understanding.
Our programme of development weekends begins with the progression series of weekends: 2 off piste courses and the piste perfection series for those who want to focus on the details of piste skiing.
From the progression series we move on to our adventure skiing programme and then on to ski touring or, if you prefer to avoid the effort of going uphill under your own steam we have a heli ski programme.It is worth remembering that if our advertised date for any of our specialist weekends does not work for you we can tailor a ski weekend to suit any group of 4 or more skiers.
Take your skiing to the next level with one of our four day progression courses.
What is a Progression weekend?
All the excitement of a Ski Weekend, with the addition of coaching from highly experienced instructors to help you reach your full potential. They will work on your technique, either on the piste (Piste Perfection) or off piste (Toutes Neiges Tous Terrains and Belle Traces).
Who is it for?
Skiers who want to take their skiing on to a higher level in a short sharp break.
If you are keen to improve your skiing in a small group, with a focus on fun and progress, all in an action packed weekend this is the one for you.
How will you benefit?
By the end of the weekend; after four days with one of our team of instructors you should see and feel a real improvement in your skiing. The combination of great personal coaching, good skiing and great service means that not only will you improve your skiing, but you'll have a holiday to remember.
Novice off piste skiers should seek the thrill of the powder, whilst piste perfectionists will feel the power and control of real carving in the fall line.
Why not get a quick weekend of coaching in before you go on your major holiday?
Off piste and back country skiing
What is an Adventure weekend?
Adventure weekends offer you the chance to explore the backcountry with our team of personally selected and highly qualified mountain guides or instructors.
We have created a programme of off-piste weekends for a variety of levels of off-piste skiers, from novice to expert.
We aim to take you away from the crowds and take your skiing to new areas and a new level.
Who is it for?
If you want to get away from the crowded pistes, look for new adventures, and discover a new different dimension to the mountain, this is the way to do it. In the safe, experienced and qualified hands.
How will you benefit?
Skiing with an expert guide and or instructor, you will escape the crowded pistes and explore the vast potential of off piste and backcountry skiing. Over the weekend you will gain confidence and develop the skills and techniques to help you master a variety of terrain to suit your ability. Off-piste intermediates and experts will discover hidden valleys and thrilling descents in the company of like-minded skiers.
Our Adventure programme can be tailored to suit abilities from progressing adventurers to hard core experts.
Off-piste skier who can tackle most snow conditions
Adventure
Touring
Heli
Based in Chamonix with Yves Detry
Yves will teach you how to master a variety of terrains and give you the confidence to tackle the off piste environment with tips and techniques for different snow conditions.
Of course if we are lucky enough to have perfect powder for the whole weekend, we will do nothing but ski powder.
Toutes Neiges Tous Terrains has been an astonishing success.
Many of our clients who have been on the TNTT course with Yves Detry have progressed on to the follow-on course, Belle Traces and then on to the introduction to ski touring course, Les Glaciers du Mont Blanc.
Skier ability: strong parallel skier - no off piste experience necessary.
Accommodation: standard.
Number of days with guide: 4.
Price: from £699.00 which includes a return shared airport transfer, four nights' B&B accommodation (twin room basis) and course fee.
Based in Chamonix with Yves Detry, Gilbert Matillat or Lionel Briand
This could be your next stage in your ski progression, continuing on from the foundations laid in Tous Neiges Tous Terrains.
Taking you onto steeper slopes, concentrating on skiing in control and building your confidence.
Our ski guides will spend some time on mountain safety. There is a possibility of a day's ski touring on the last day.
The next step from Belle Traces is Les Glaciers du Mont Blanc and then into adventure or ski touring. It really does open up a whole new world of skiing.
Skier ability: strong parallel skier, with some off piste experience. Ideally you will have completed Tous Neiges Tous Terrains.
Accommodation: standard.
Number of days with guide: 4.
Price: from £699.00 which includes a return shared airport transfer, four night's B&B accommodation (twin room basis) and course fee.
Based in Chamonix with Guillaume Ravanel
Now in its ninth year, this ski course has been an amazing success.
We all know instinctively that there is a better skier locked inside each of us.
This is a 4 day ski course with one of our top instructors which will aim to track it down and coax it out.
The course is for those of us who are good intermediate skiers, capable of skiing any piste albeit not quite as well as we would like.
The objective is to build on existing strengths, eradicate bad habits, and provide a helpful leg up from the notorious intermediate skier plateau.
Be warned though it is addictive!
Skier ability: Good parallel skier on blue and red runs.
Accommodation: standard.
Number of days with instructor: 4.
Price: from £699.00 which includes a return shared airport transfer, four nights' B&B accommodation (twin room basis) and course fee.
Based in Chamonix with Guillaume Ravanel
Further progression from Piste Perfection. We warned you it was addictive!
Run by one of our best instructors, who will aim to refine those techniques developed in Piste Perfection and enable you to tackle steeper runs, moguls, varied terrain and possibly introduction to off piste skiing.
Skier ability: experienced parallel skier. Ideally a graduate of Piste Perfection.
Accommodation: standard.
Number of days with instructor: 4.
Price: from £699.00 which includes a return shared airport transfer, four nights' B&B accommodation (twin room basis) and course fee.
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Alagna/Monte Rosa
This is a huge largely unknown area. Predominantly South facing with gradients ranging from flattering to terrifying. The skiing is in huge bowls or the challenge of narrow couloirs. Seppi our guide in Alagna has many secret valleys, which can only be accessed via an inexpensive helicopter ride.
We tend to visit Alagna in late January or Early February when the south facing slopes are heaped with fresh snow and have not been exposed to the spring sun. March weekends take in higher altitude skiing on the spring snow of the glaciers.
Skier Ability: strong off piste skier.
Accommodation: Standard hotel, or self-catering apartments.
Number of days with guide: four
Price: from £739.00,
which includes; accommodation, four days mountain guide, transfer to and from the resort
7 nights half board accommodation in the Highlands Park Hotel on a twin room basis.
7 days skiing with Mountain guides.
1 returns transfer to and from Srinagar.
1 night's half board on a houseboat.
Ski passes for the 7 day stay.
40% deposit required to confirm the reservation.
Winter sports Insurance.
AITO and ATOL bonding.
We will run 2 groups, in order that we can have the flexibility to match ski ability and fitness.
Cost based on 6 people per group per guide: £1550 per person.
Click here for more information
Click here for photos of our 2010 trip to Kashmir
Click here for photos from our 2010 Kashmir clients
Click here for photos of Lake Dal and the houseboats
Following a very successful trip to Saas 2 seasons ago, the plan is to use the high north facing slopes to maximum advantage for late season ski touring and couloirs skiing.
Saas Fee has some very interesting glacier terrain within touring access (2-3hours) of the lifts.
There will also be an opportunity to bag a couple of 4000m peaks. If the group was so disposed and conditions permitted a day with a helicopter could be organised.
Proposed routes (depending on weather and conditions) are:-
Fluchthorn (3790 m)
Allalinhorn (4027 m)
Alphubel (4026m)
Adler Glacier, Adler Pass (3789m)
These descents will be accessed by lifts, skins and crampons, to give you in excess of 2000m vertical descent.
Number of days with guide: 4
Accommodation: standard.
Price: from £799
Excellent Flights into Grenoble with Easyjet, short 1hr 30minutes transfer, puts La Grave firmly back on the Ski Weekend Map.
Superb skiing, in La Grave and Les Deux Alpes with the Possibility of a days heli skiing just on the Italian Border
Les Glaciers Du Mont Blanc
Based in Chamonix with Yves Detry, Gilbert Matillat or Lionel Briand.
The aim is to ski some of the great glacier descents in the Mont Blanc area. The descents will be accessed by lift and ski touring.
This is true wilderness skiing with some of the most amazing guides in the valley.
Proposed routes (depending on weather and conditions) are:-
Glacier du Tour Via the col du Passon (3028m)
Glacier de Beugeant via the col de Beugeant (2807m)
Glacier de Saleinaz via the col du Chardonnet (3323m)
Glacier des Grands via the pte. Grands
Glacier de Trient via the col du Chardonnet and Fenetre de Saleinaz (3323m)
Glacier du Geant and out through the Valle Blanche
These descents will be accessed by lifts and will involve some skinning at the start, to give you in excess of 2000m vertical descent.
Skier ability: this is a totally off piste adventure requiring strong parallel skiers, with off piste experience and a good level of fitness.
If you have already done a TNTT you will be fine, if not book one of the January courses now and then join us on Les Glaciers du Mont Blanc in the spring. If you have not done a TNTT course, but feel you would be up to the adventure please call us for a questionnaire.
Number of days with guide: 4
Accommodation: standard.
Price: from £739
The Chamonix - Zermatt Haute Route is the classic high mountain tour.
Ski Weekend have great experience of organising Haute Routes to Zermatt and beyond.
We are more than happy to discuss your plans and can tailor a tour to suit you.
One of the most popular options is to combine a Glacier du Mont Blanc course with an Haute Route, giving you 8 days of skiing with a mountain guide.
We normally aim to take 5 days for the 129km trip.
Our departure timings and route are arranged to avoid the crowds and make the most of the conditions.
Typical itinerary and cost (based on 4 participants).
Arrive Friday 9 April.
Depart Saturday 17 April.
Ski in cham with guide; 10, 11, 12 April.
Ski with guide on HR: 5 days.
Total of 4 nights in Jumelles and 8 days guided skiing.
Total £1249.00 per person.
For Gavin Baxter's Haute Route diary click here
For a link to some inspiring photos of Gavin's tour click here
For Martin Drummond's entertaining 2002 Haute Route diary click here
Keep grinding away
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Giving access to huge vertical descents max 2700ms, min 1500ms and average 2000ms. That’s a lot of turns. A good day would be 3 -4 drops, average is 2 drops. More often 1 or 2 drops in the morning and then some skiing using lifts in the afternoon.
It's really it’s about quality of snow rather than vertical.
In Europe most Helicopters are Eurocopter B3 Squirrels or Ecureils, twin turbine, with excellent altitude capabilities, 4 guests in the back and 1 guide in the front. The Italians sometimes use Augusta helicopters, but the Capacity is no greater
Cost is based on: per rotation, per helicopter and the norm is 1 mountain guide per helicopter.
We use the latest avalanche safety equipment ABS air bag rucksacks, transceivers, with every guest carrying avalanche shovels and probes. Skiing on fat skis to enable skiers to float over the snow
Heli-ski pick up and drop off points are very carefully regulated and there is pressure from the green and environmental movements, who do not like heli-skiing at all!
Over the years Ski Weekend have taken guests to heli-ski in: Northern European Alps, North Sweden, Greenland, Kamchatka (opposite Alaska) Russian Caucuses, Alaska and of course Canada.
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Skiing requirement: strong parallel skier with some off piste experience.
Italian Heli Ski areas:
Valgrischence:- the secret heli-ski valley.
Courmayeur and the South side of Mont Blanc and La Thuile.
Alagna, the Monte Rosa Massif and Gressoney. Descents from the Monte Rosa Plateau (4000m) and down into Zermatt. Return via the Klein Matterhorn Breithorn cable car – Cima Bianca 120kms in the day.
The Algana guides have a private heli-ski valley where there are always hidden caches of powder snow, even when it has been skied out elsewhere.
Heli-skiing in the Dolomites and from the summit of the Marmolada
Heli Mont Blanc
Helicopter pick up from Courmayeur, a long flight to the very difficult drop off at the Piton des Italians, right on the French Italian border at 3700ms, then long skin and climb to the Dome de Gouter, on up to the summit 4810ms, if you are really lucky with the conditions ski down the North face and all the way down to Chamonix, it’s a long day!!
Switzerland
Heli areas are extensive with lots and lots of terrain
Based in Chamonix, crossing the border to the DZ and pick up at Finhaut just 20 minutes from Chamonix, gives access to the Trient Plateau and the East side of Mont Blanc, one of the all time great descents, down the Midi Grandes glacier.
Verbier – Zermatt
Bernese Oberland, with some spectacular drops on the Susten Pass and Rosenegg glacier
New This year, we will run a "Heli Top Secret" weekend:
3 days Heli skiing, logistically challenging! The goal to find the deepest and freshest snow, and get access to it by helicopter.
Following last winter’s Introduction (see Galleries) click here
4 day Heli weekend, making first descents on the Troll Peninsula and the Forgotten land,
Unique experience in “nice land”
We have 2 possible itineraries.
Route One: Chamonix-Zermatt
Chamonix, Le Tour by ski lift, ski down into Trient, Switzerland, heli pick up and drop on the Plateau de Trient.
Ski down to Champex or Praz Torrents.
Heli pick up and drop onto Rosa Blanche above Verbier, ski down to Evolene.
Heli pick up and drop on the Pigne de Arolla.
Overnight in Arolla.
Next morning, an early heli pick up and drop on the Peigne, quite a big skin up to the Tete de Vapelline above the Italian-Swiss border.
Ski down for beers in Zermatt.
Route two: Italian heli Haute Route
Courmayeur Italy.
1 or 2 drops on the high glaciers of the south side of the Mont Blanc Massif, then heli pick up from Lac Chombal and drop on the Mont Fortin.
Heli pickup in La Thuile, drop on the Rutour Glacier, ski down to Planaval in the Valgrischence valley.
Late lunch and a final heli drop to ski as far down into the Aosta valley as the snow permits.
Overnight in Cervina,
Next morning heli pick up and drop from Cervina onto the Dames Blanches, with 1 or 2 drops, then a heli pick up and drop at the Col de Vapelline.
Ski down for beers in Zermatt.
These trips are totally tailor-made to suit you.
The helicopter capacity means they work best with four clients and one guide.
For more information on one of the most exciting and unique skiing experiences contact Gavin Foster: UK 01392 878351 gavin@skiweekend.com
All our ski guides and instructors live locally and are selected as much for their personality and communication skills as for their professional expertise.
Their familiarity with particular ski areas and their understanding of prevailing snow conditions ensures that you get the most from your time with them.
Yves Detry.
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A member of the Bureau de Guide Independence since 1972. Yves is a highly skilled professional - particularly in extreme terrain (first descent on skis of the North Face of the Aiguille du Midi).
He has taken part in many exepeditions, including the first French tour to Sishapangma in Tibet and expeditions to the Himalayas and Pakistan.
Yves now dedicates much of his time to teaching and his new passion of ultra marathons.
A day in his company is an unforgettable experience.
Yves will be leading the Toutes Neiges, Tous Terrains courses.
Gilbert Matillat
UIAGM qualified guide Gilbert has been guiding in the Chamonix valley for the last 25 years.
He has led Ski Weekend clients both in the summer and the winter.
He and his family spent the winter season of 1996 in Canada, where he worked as a heliski guide and was able to perfect his English.
Gilbert will be leading the Toutes Neiges, Tous Terrains, Belle Traces and many of our off piste adventures.
Lionel Briand
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Born in Nantes and coming form a Celtic family, Loinel was destined to be a sailor.
Passionate about off piste skiing, he is working more and more with Ski Weekend. He claims to have the best Frenchie accent of all the Ski Weekend guides.
An avid climber,you can find him all around the world (Thailand, Madagascar, Spain and Jordan).
He’s a sailor, mountain guide and ski instructor. Lionel has been teaching in the Argentiere and Les Houches ESF for over 20 years.
He is looking forward to making your day.
Eve Narcy
Eve is a mum and since 1993, a fully quallified ski and snowboard instructor.
She has passed on her expertise to many Ski Weekend guests and her 14 year old son Armand, who is one of the top junior skiers in the Chamonix Valley. Next in line is her 2 year old daughter Heidi.
Eve’s never afraid of hiking higher and higher to ski or climb a new peak.
Trekking is also her summer job. As a member of the famous "Compagnie des Guides de Chamonix" she’s used to guiding people all around the Mont Blanc, Matterhorn and Grand Paradiso summits. If you ski with Eve, don’t forget to ask about her "magic potion", home-made and always at the bottom of her back pack.
Nicolas Poncet
Guide de Haute Montagne, Prof de ski de Fond.
Originally from the Jura. Nico is 42 years old and has worked with Ski Weekend over many years.
Qualified at the age of 21! One of the youngest guides to qualify in France, and since 1988 a member of the legendary Compagnie des Guides de Chamonix.
His patience is legendary, and sometimes when you think he says yes he means NO!
Seppi Enzio
Born and bred in Alagana and one of nine brothers and sisters, five of whom are guides, Seppi is UIAGM qualified and has spent many years working with expeditions in the Himalayas, where he met Yves Detry. His unique knowledge of the Monte Rosa and his own secret valleys make skiing with him a special experience.
Guillaume Ravanel Born and bred in Chamonix with Les Grands-Montets as a playground. With 11 years experience of competition and 15 years of teaching in the Alps and Colorado Rockies, Guillaume is a fully qualified, English speaking ski and snowboard instructor. He is waiting for you to share a nice day and improve your ski and snowboarding technique. His never ending enthusiasm and passion for teaching both adults and children will ensure your technique will be improved.
Anne Bosvieux
Anne is 39 years old and has lived in Chamonix for the past ten years. A fully qualified, English speaking, ski and snowboard instructor with 12 years experience in Chamonix and the surrounding resorts. Anne is also an experienced sailing and windsurfing instructor; she has considerable experience in organising and leading children’s expeditions/activities. She is also trained and qualified to help adults and children discover different sports. Aside from her professional activities; she regularly paraglides and rock climbs. Anne loves chocolate.
Bruno Martin
A UIAGM qualified mountain guide since1989. Bruno has organised many expeditions to Africa, mainly to Mts. Kenya and Kilimanjaro. With a passion for off piste skiing and a talent for finding fresh powder snow and untracked runs, Bruno looks forward to sharing the exhilaration that only the wilderness of the high mountains can offer.
George Unia
George (aka Jojo) has a passion for wine and environmental protection. He has trekked in Nepal and Ecuador. His climbs include: Bonatti and American direct on Les Drus. Born in Nice, George now lives in Servoz and is looking forward to guiding you on the greatest slopes and will tell you all about Chateauneuf-du-Pape.
Matthieu Desprat
Since 1996 being a mountain guide all year round is my luck and happiness. The beautiful experiences that I share with my clients are never the same: from climbing in the Hogar desert to free ride in Chamonix and the Alaskan tops. See you very soon on skis!!
© Ski Weekend 2009. Weekend Travel Ltd, Darts Farm Village, Topsham, Exeter, Devon EX3 OQH | Telephone +44(0) 1392 878353
